The Evolution of the Christmas Garment #2

…..or Why is There No Longer a Tabi Store?

Hmmm, now what do I recall about the 90’s? My wardrobe was entirely purchased at Northern Reflections, my socks all matched my shirts and I got my waist-length hair cut short. Seems to me “cottage” décor was the thing and people were starting to get into minty coloured carpet and pale grey. Curtains were getting fancier and people were nuts over watercolour pictures of pale pink, blue and grey. Christmas sweaters were really the thing now.

By now manufacturers had figured out how to make fancy on the cheap using appliqué. Today’s selection is also made of ramie and cotton but of much inferior quality than that of sweater #1. The embroidery is all machine done; only hand-work is in the beading and the beads are all plastic. I would go on but it’s Florida and 80 degrees outside and I am well over 50 and wearing a black sweater. Quick, a pic, so I can get out of this rig – it is heavy when it is wet with sweat. Which makes me wonder, how did all those middle-aged women who purchased these manage to survive the heat and close quarters of the Christmas house party wearing a button up sweater?

What I’m Reading Now

The Cat's Table by Michael Ondaatje ♥♥♥♥
Half Broken Things by Morag Joss ♥♥♥½
Irreplaceable by Stephen Lovely ♥♥
The Feast of Love by Charles Baxter ♥♥♥½
Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner ♥♥♥♥♥
The Devil You Know by Wayne Johnson ♥♥♥
Burial Rites by Hannah Kent ♥♥♥♥
Flaubert's Parrot by Julian Barnes ♥♥♥♥½
A Voyage Long and Strange by Tony Horwitz ♥♥♥♥
Yellow Crocus by Laila Ibrahim ♥♥♥½
No. 13 Washington Square by Leroy Scott ♥♥½
Christopher Carson by John SC Abbott♥♥♥♥
Lucien Freud, Eyes Wide Open by Phoebe Hoban ♥♥½
The Blessing Way by Tony Hillerman ♥♥♥♥
An American Childhood by Annie Dillard ♥♥♥♥
Brunelleschi's Dome by Ross King ♥♥♥♥
Pigs in Heaven by Barbara Kingsolver ♥♥♥
The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga (audio) ♥♥♥♥
Into the Deep Unknown - Land of the Tent Dwellers by Mike Parker♥♥♥ (great [pictures)
The Death of Kings by Bernard Cornwell (audio)♥♥♥1/2
Back Fire by Catherine Coulter (audio book)♥♥♥
In the Mersey Woods published by the paper company
The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood (audio book)♥♥♥♥
The Kite Runner (audio book)♥♥♥♥♥
Animal Dreams by Barbara Kingsolver ♥♥♥1/2
The Bean Trees by Barbara Kingsolver ♥♥♥1/2
The Round House by Louise Erdrich ♥♥♥♥
Empire Falls by Richard Russo ♥♥♥
Dear Everbody by Anne Budgell ♥♥♥♥
The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera ♥♥
The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner ♥♥♥♥♥
Turn of Mind by Alice LaPlante
Stones from the River by Ursula Hegi ♥♥♥♥♥